'Movementism': what it is, what it isn't, and why it matters

One
characteristic of debates on the radical left in recent years is a fondness for
wantonly throwing the term 'movementism' around as a term of disparagement.
This political trend, we are led to believe, is a rightward-deviating break
from the revolutionary tradition. It simultaneously rejects the working class
as the agent of social change and rejects the need for independent
revolutionary organisation (two things which - combined together - are regarded
as the very definition of what it means to be a Leninist).

Most
recently, the charge of 'movementism' was made by Alex Callinicos, the SWP's
leading theoretician, and directed (it seems) towards a rather indiscriminate
range of targets, but principally a dig at those of us in Counterfire. Here is
one brief account:

‘Alex paid tribute to the intellectual
and political abilities of John Rees, a former leading member of the party. But
since John Rees had left the SWP he had broken with certain Marxist
fundamentals, said Alex, particularly by claiming generalised forms of protest
were as important as strikes by workers. Consequently John Rees was now acting
as a cover for the insurgent left reformism Alex had been warning of. This
demonstrated that the SWP’s model of Leninism was “precious” and should not be
toyed with: life outside the party could only lead to the swamp of reformism.’

This is
rather cynical rhetoric, of course. Denouncing someone on the outside - someone
who used to be a leading figure but is now persona
non grata - is a way of undermining internal critics (guilt by association) and diverting
attention from your own problems (the passage above reminded me of the last 3 paragraphs of this chapter from Animal Farm).

'He made a sharp distinction between
the Leninist approach and what he described as the political degeneration of
John Rees, who provided left cover for the reformism of the trade union
bureaucracy by asserting that it is “ridiculous” to believe that strikes are
superior to demonstrations and direct action. This opportunist formulation,
Callinicos argued, replaced proletarian class struggle with “movementism”. (see
the footnote in Le Blanc’s article for what John Rees actually said at the
People’s Assembly)

In the
Callinicos worldview there are basically three tendencies on the radical left:
Leninism, left reformism and movementism. The first is struggling, while the
latter two trends are apparently thriving.

And these
latter two trends are really two variants on a theme, or two sides of the same
coin: left reformism is focused on parliament and the Labour Party while
movementism is concerned with street-based protest movements, but they both
apparently involve a rejection of revolutionary organisation and a downplaying
of the role of 'organised workers' (trade unions) in social change. This
downplaying is treated as synonymous with writing off the working class as a
political actor.

The accusation of 'movementism'

In very
general terms the phenomenon of 'movementism' - according to this perspective -
involves such things as Occupy and UK Uncut, but it is really meant as a
criticism of elements on the radical left who have supposedly over-emphasised
direct action, protests, etc, at the expense of trade unions and strike action.
This is how the SWP leadership defines itself against Counterfire. It is also,
by extension, an attempt to smear internal opponents to the current leadership,
i.e. by associating the internal Opposition with an external enemy, the opposition
can be cowed and the loyalist cadres can be rallied to support the leadership.

The critique
of 'movementism' involves, then, identifying three linked characteristics: giving up the
project of building a revolutionary party, rejecting the agency of the working
class, and (in place of these two rejections) a commitment to movement
building. This trend of 'movementism' is also generally conflated with other
non-Leninist currents such as 'autonomism' and 'feminism', which are in fact
distinct phenomena.

'One type of frustration – thinking there are short cuts in
the form of Stop the War-type united fronts – can be seen in the way the split
from our organisation [Counterfire] has developed: a movementism complemented
by a theoretical downplaying of the working class and the role of revolutionary
organisation.'

In recent
history the term was first revived in 2008/09, as a way of justifying the SWP
leadership's sharp turn away from the sort of united front building (Stop the
War, Respect, anti-capitalism) that had characterised the previous period. A
positive project of movement-building was swiftly turned into a negative trend
of 'movementism', with lots of dark mutterings about the dangers of
'liquidationism' and 'dilution' of Marxist politics. This has now reached the
point where Alex Callinicos can - apparently with a straight face -
characterise perfectly sensible remarks about needing to deploy a range of
tactics as a break from Leninism.

A brief history of 'movementism'

I will return
to the current debate about 'movementism' below, but first let's consider where
the concept comes from. It is basically a creature of the retreat and downturn
for working-class struggle that began in the mid-1970s. The disorientation of
the revolutionary left after the international upturn in working class
struggles ended in around 1975 - with the defeat of the Portuguese Revolution, Italy's
'historic compromise', Britain's 'social contract', the end of mass workers'
unrest and so on - was accompanied by a general shift to the Right and a profound
weakening of rank-and-file workers' organisation. This was accompanied by the marginalisation of
Marxist ideas (replaced, over time, with ideas labelled 'poststructuralist',
'postmodernist' etc).

One aspect of
the rightwards shift, the downturn in struggle and the marginalisation of
revolutionary socialism was a growth in what was sometimes termed
'movementism', linked to the 'new movements' or 'social movements'.
This trend was regarded on the revolutionary left as a shift to the right
because it downplayed class politics, wrote off any need for independent
revolutionary organisation (with much rhetoric about how 'Leninism' was dated,
undemocratic and patriarchal), and paid little attention to trade union
activity.

Criticising
such 'movementism', it should be stressed, did not mean neglecting the kind of
issues that it tended to promote: gender, race, sexuality, and so on. It did
mean - and rightly so - having a distinct Marxist analysis of such issues
combined with a practical approach that emphasised connections between
oppressed groups and the working class movement (and a stress on mass activity,
where possible, rather than elitist and isolationist forms of action).

Having acritical stance towards 'movementism' was important for the revolutionary left:
in a hostile climate, where there was considerable pressure from the right, it
was necessary to maintain a distinctive Marxist pole and that often meant emphasising
differences with others, while nonetheless working with non-Marxists and
ex-Marxists in joint political action where viable.

So, a
critique of 'movementism' was never the same thing as rejecting joint political
activity with others. It never meant neglecting issues of women's oppression,
racism and so on. It was a historically specific critique that responded to a
fashionable - and all-too-real - rejection of revolutionary organisation
coupled with a downplaying of class politics (especially any emphasis on the
working class as collective agent of social change).

It's also
worth mentioning the SWP's actual political practice in the period between 1975
and the early 1980s. Many party activists were involved in the defence of
abortion rights in the mid-1970s, through protests and other campaigning
activity. The Anti Nazi League was launched in 1977 and formed a huge part of
the party's activities until 1979. The Right to Work Campaign began as a rather
low-key affair, but became a bigger priority once it was clear that it had
greater traction than the union-based Rank and File Movements (which petered
out in the context of the Social Contract, which saw union leaders make massive
compromises to the Labour government's attacks on workers).

The SWP took
the riots in Brixton and elsewhere very seriously (they were not a distraction from
the 'class struggle'). The CND demonstrations of the early 1980s were important
for the party, while the period also saw attempts - only partially successful - to
relate to fights over oppression through publications like Women's Voice and
Flame. (see Ian Birchall's biography of Tony Cliff for more on this period).

Put simply:
there may have been a strong critique of 'movementism' (rightly so), but this
was not a period of abstention from real-live movements. In the context of defeats
for the trade unions, and a serious erosion of rank-and-file strength, there
was increased emphasis on struggles and forms of organisation that went beyond
the trade unions. This did not mean abandoning the unions - far from it. It
should also be noted that a big priority for the SWP was winning people within
broader campaigns to class politics and - in concrete terms - there was a
stress on utilising the unions to build the movements.

Seattle and after

The year 2000
marked a watershed. In the aftermath of the big Seattle anti-WTO protests of
November/December 1999, there was a turn towards anti-capitalist organising by
the SWP. This was particularly marked by mobilisations to the large-scale
anti-capitalist protests in Prague, Genoa and elsewhere, participation in the
World and European Social Forums, and by attempts to develop stronger networks
domestically, e.g. a Globalise Resistance speaking tour in early 2001 (which
the party was central to) drew turnouts that make it comparable to the recent People's
Assembly public rallies around the country.

A key element
in this anti-capitalist work was an emphasis on winning trade union backing for
initiatives - while more anarchist or autonomist elements in the movement tended to
be dismissive of this - and articulating a resolutely anti-systemic politics
against the movement's more moderate elements.

Simultaneous
to this growth of anti-capitalism was the opening of a new chapter in left-wing
electoral politics. This took different forms on different sides of the border,
but the SWP everywhere across the UK became centrally involved in important new
electoral initiatives, while continually endeavouring to link what we did in
elections to broader efforts to build the left and the movement.

From
September 2001 onwards the Stop the War Coalition became a major priority and
gave fresh impetus to both the anti-capitalist networks and the electoral work:
the former was reflected, for example, in the centrality of anti-imperialist
politics to London's European Social Forum in October 2004, and the latter
found expression in the emergence of Respect from the anti-war movement (in
particular, but not limited to, the relationships we developed with some
Muslims who had not previously associated with the radical left).

None of this
movement-building was an example of the kind of 'movementist' thinking which
had previously been criticised. It reflected new opportunities which were
opening up. The anti-capitalist movement was an extremely welcome shift in our
political direction and provided a vital new audience for us; it was in no way
a retreat from trade union struggle or a shift to the right.

Stop the War
was never, as Gareth from Hackney suggested above, seen as a 'short cut' to
anything: it was a crucial forum of resistance in its own right (and an
enormously effective one!) and a means of demonstrating the relevance of
revolutionary organisation, thus allowing us opportunities to articulate
Marxist ideas and build distinctively revolutionary organisation. We had mixed results in doing this, but that was our aim and orientation.

Finally, the
electoral formations we participated in were an extension of these anti-capitalist
and anti-war struggles into the electoral sphere, while reaching out to a layer
of disillusioned 'old Labour' people who were moving away from an allegiance to
Labourism but who weren't convinced by explicitly revolutionary ideas. Building the party in an age of mass movements?

All of this
was valuable. All of it was compatible with the revolutionary socialist
tradition. None of it meant an abandonment of either revolutionary organisation
or the working class as the agent of social change.

It did,
however, reflect two core understandings: in an era of political radicalisation
and protest movements, revolutionaries can most effectively build their own
organisation and spread their ideas by participating centrally in the
movements; and, secondly, movement-building is not an alternative to the
working class, but rather a particular expression of working class resistance
and organisation. Trade unions remain hugely important and need to be an arena
of political action for revolutionaries, but limiting ourselves to them would
be foolish.

From 2008
onwards - burnt by the demoralising and difficult experience of Respect's
collapse - the SWP's leadership and a majority of its cadre backed the idea
that a new perspective was required: one that turned away from united fronts
and emphasised 'party building' largely in isolation from the shaping of
broader coalitions. I won't recount here what I have already written, but I
will add that this shift in perspective involved the caricaturing of the old
perspective as 'movementism'. Increasingly there was revisionism towards the
party's own recent history - Respect had been misguided from the start, Stop
the War's achievements were downplayed, the anti-capitalist work was rarely
mentioned.

Most
important, however, was the idea that such a movement-building perspective was
not relevant to the age of economic crisis and, after May 2010, the age of
austerity. Instead of a strategic focus on building united fronts, a
combination of three things was necessary: trade union work, narrow 'party
fronts' (Right to Work, Unite the Resistance) and socialist propaganda about
the capitalist crisis (embodied in party routines of branch meetings and paper
sales). In this context the rhetoric of 'movementism' became a useful way of
disparaging those of us who promoted broad coalition-building against austerity that could link trade unions with campaigns groups, deploying the full range of methods in the process.

The future of Leninism

What is falsely
characterised as ‘movementism’ today is completely different from what was
correctly referred to as ‘movementism’ in the radically different circumstances
of the late 1970s and the 1980s. Revolutionary strategy which stresses the
building of broad movements against austerity, racism and war is a strategy
with class politics at its heart. It involves a commitment to using the
strengths of the protest movements to reinvigorate the trade unions and,
especially, to encourage confidence in workers to use strike action as well as
other methods to challenge the government and employers.

This is,
indeed, a key characteristic of the People’s Assembly, which emphasises a range
of tactics and explicitly refers to strikes – and solidarity action with
strikes – as an integral component of the fight to end austerity. This, it
seems to me, is precisely how socialists should be shaping a wider movement - a movement which also contains people who largely dismiss trade unions altogether and,
conversely, people who are part of the union movement but reluctant to pursue
the kind of mass co-ordinated strike action we need to win.

Finally, this
commitment to the People’s Assembly does not for a moment mean abandoning
distinctively revolutionary organisation. The building of united fronts and the
building of revolutionary organisation are mutually complementary poles. The fact
that people have rejected one particular organisation does not mean they have
rejected revolutionary organisation altogether.

Marxists in
today’s world need political analysis of capitalism and the working class as
they really are today, a strategy that reflects actual social forces, and ways
of organising that connect with current forms of resistance and organisation.
The defensive repetition of dogma and abstract truths is no substitute for
this.

1 comment:

The People's Assemblies are subsitutionism. Counterfire setting up SWP-like fronts that pretend to be the movement but actually try to substitute for it in the most opportunist manner in order to consort with left reformists and other opportunists without the need of a principled programme. This is not the united front this is frontism or movementism or subsitutionism. It is certainly opportunism.